Leaving Las Vegas (Entangled Ignite) (16 page)

Glory’s stomach twisted. With danger bearing down on her home, she didn’t know if she’d ever be hungry again. “We need a ride down to Beaux. Now.”

“No,” Luke objected. “Not Beaux.”

“I thought you said the entire place was safe as could be.”

“Right. And they’ll be even safer if I don’t have to pull security guards off the main drag to protect you. You can’t go home just yet.”

She sputtered. “So what do we do?”

“Steer clear until my guys catch Tiffanette and her people. Hide out. Rent a car and get someplace safe. Find a hotel room.”

Conan glanced back and forth between the two of them, his expression curious. “You want to tell me what’s going on? Or should I just keep pretending to understand you?”

“There are some people looking for us,” Luke explained.

Conan nodded at Glory. “What’d she do?”

“I didn’t do anything,” she snapped. She grabbed a longneck bottle from the tray and downed a chug of beer, then wiped her mouth dry with the back of her hand. “Luke’s right. We’re being chased. Of course, what he doesn’t get is that there are no car rentals within a hundred miles. As for hotels, there are a few in Miller’s Crossing, but anything close enough to reach tonight is also close enough to get the word out: ‘Glory’s home, and she’s got a friend.’ Hell, the word was out the moment we walked through the door. It’ll be all over the mountain in an hour.”

After a moment of silence, Conan coughed, catching her attention. “If you promise not to burn the place down, you can stay in the spare room upstairs,” he said, his gruffness momentarily gone. “There might be some clean clothes in my spare room that fit you. The bed has fresh sheets.”

Luke looked at Glory. “Beaux is safer with you away. Let’s take what he’s offering.”

“And Conan? This bar? Are they safer?”

Luke and Conan exchanged glances.

Conan shook his head. “Gloria Allen, no outsider knows you’re here. And no one who sees you tonight would mention it to an outsider. You’ll be safe.”

“Fine,” she groused.

“I can pay you for the room,” Luke offered to Conan.

The man raised an eyebrow. “You
really
aren’t from around here. In these parts, we don’t take payment for helping people out.”

When Glory caught Luke’s puzzled expression, she almost laughed. Almost.

Chapter Eighteen

They spent the rest of the evening hanging out at the bar, talking to some of the locals, drinking beer, and playing poker with bikers. Glory teased him, testing his limits—trying to make him pay for keeping her out of Beaux.

By the time they got to the cramped second-story bedroom with its old double bed, battered dresser, and attached half bath, barely illuminated by the flickering light in the parking lot, Luke was ready to explode. Now she was in danger of getting exactly what she wanted. Him. Standing in the doorway, watching her pull the covers down on their borrowed bed, his entire body was tense with desire, so aware of her it hurt. Every time Glory smiled, he sucked in a breath. Each time she laughed, his skin tingled and lightning shot down his spine.

She was so damn beautiful. But it was more than just lust—hard as that was to believe—it was something else entirely. The way she always threw herself headfirst into every situation, even if that meant putting herself in danger. He’d seen the look of anguish on her face when she’d realized that Tiffanette might come looking for her in Beaux.

It wasn’t just a town or a community. Not to Glory. For her, every single wayward soul and crooked character was a member of the family. She loved them all completely, unconditionally.

Luke had never been jealous of an entire town before. He didn’t much like the feeling.

“Are you sure there’s nothing we can do?” Glory straightened.

“I called the security team—again—before we came upstairs. Nothing’s happening.”

“They’re not from around here. They don’t know who belongs on the street. Maybe we should go help—”

“It’s two in the morning. No one belongs on the street.”

Her teeth dug into her bottom lip, clearly not convinced.

Hell
. Luke stepped forward, lifting his free hand to cup her cheek. “I have everything under control. There’s nothing we can do tonight.”

“Nothing?”

“Well, almost nothing.” He consumed her mouth with his with a ferocity that chilled him to the bone. He pushed her backward until she was lying flat on the bed underneath him. The ancient mattress groaned in response.

Tomorrow they’d part ways. He’d make sure she got safely home, then he’d find the nearest airport and head back to Las Vegas. Something dawned on him. He hadn’t thought about the opening for Cleopatra’s Asp for hours. Odd how everything seemed different with Glory. His obsessions paled in comparison with the woman next to him.

He skimmed his hands up underneath her shirt, tugging at the cheap polyester, trying to pull it up over her head. A soft whimper made him pause. He pushed himself up on his forearms. “Do you want me to stop?”

“Buttons,” she mumbled, letting out a short gasp when his fingers brushed against her bare belly.

With fingers made clumsy by lust, he struggled to unbutton her shirt.

Her breath came faster. “I need you to touch me,” she said. “Now.”

“I’ll buy you a new shirt.” He let out a savage growl, tearing at the cheap fabric until buttons popped off and rolled around in every direction.

One hand pulled her up while the other maneuvered behind her back. A moment later her bra was gone, disappearing somewhere in the dim bedroom, and her breasts were unconstrained.

“Damn. I was wrong,” Luke swore. “
This
is my fantasy.”

“What?”

“You.” His mouth lowered slightly to run across smooth skin. Every gasping breath was audible now. Each heartbeat was a response to his touch, sending a tremor through her body. He touched his tongue to the rock-hard nub of her right nipple and then wrapped his lips around it and sucked. For a moment, Glory lost all semblance of control, crying out against him.

If he was ready to explode from the feeling of her hand against his thigh, then all it seemed to take to bring her to orgasm was his mouth on her breast. He grazed her nipple with his teeth, and she wrapped her arms around his chest to hold him tight. One hand lifted to run through his hair. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, probably intent on losing herself in the pleasure of his mouth on her flesh.

Luke didn’t have that kind of patience. He dropped his hand down to unbutton her shorts. The sound of the zipper being pulled down rasped over the noise still coming from the bar below them. Bottles clinking and classic rock on the jukebox. A laugh, a scream, and then it all faded away into the distance.

There was no waiting now, no putting things off. He tugged her shorts down over her hips, the rough motion taking her panties too, leaving her bare and wet underneath his hand.

“Please,” she whimpered. Sharp nails dug into his back, fighting to gain his attention.

He worked a single finger inside her, making Glory rock forward against him. A long moan escaped her lips, and then she was begging again.

Luke had found her clitoris, the sweet spot that had her gasping and moaning, writhing in his arms until she came in a flurry of shrieks and sighs. When it was over, she lay limp underneath him for a long moment.

“Luke…” This time her voice was louder, stronger. A deep breath expelled slowly from her lungs. “Can we take things slow?”

“Slow?” Where had that come from? He pulled his head up to give her a quick kiss on the lips. “You’ve been barreling forward like a roller coaster coming off the tracks. Now you want things slow?”

“I— It’s just—” She stammered against his mouth. “This afternoon was great, but it’s been a while since I…was in a relationship.”

“How long?” A soft question, spoken against the edge of her neck.

“Three years. It’s been three years.”

Luke stilled. “You’ve got to be freaking kidding me. What happened?”

“Nothing,” she said in a small voice.

Here in a borrowed bedroom, naked in front of a man who still had all of his clothes on, the wild woman who’d bluffed her way into a high-stakes poker game was incapable of telling him anything but the truth. She sucked in a breath, then continued. “And I really do mean nothing. Beaux’s not exactly Las Vegas. I know every man in town. Likes, dislikes, silly dance movies, and seduction techniques. It’s not exactly easy to get all hot and bothered about a man when you know his secrets. I was beginning to think that maybe I couldn’t get excited about a man anymore.”

“We both know that’s not true.” Luke knew he’d been revving her engines ever since they’d met, but there was more to sex than lust and pure, primal desire. More than what they’d had at the river. There was also intimacy and trust. That was what she was talking about—the kind of sex that brought two people so close together it was hard to tell where one stopped and the other started.

“This is all going to be over tomorrow,” Glory said. “So can we just take things slow tonight?”

He massaged one of her breasts, paying special attention to her tight nipples. Brushed his lips against the tender skin at her collarbone. Made his way back up her thigh with his other hand. “Glory, I will do whatever it takes to make you happy. What do you want?”

“I just want to feel you inside of me.”

“Damn.” That had to be the sexiest thing he’d ever heard. “I think that’s a desire I can accommodate.”

His teeth dug into her flesh, making her squirm. His pants hit the floor with a thud, followed quickly by his shirt. He didn’t have to worry about his boxers—the river had carried those away. For the second time in a day, he ripped open a condom wrapper and rolled the thin latex down over his rock-hard cock. Then he was back on top of her, his mouth muffling her outbursts of pleasure. He reached down between them, pressed her legs open wide, and buried himself deep inside her.

Her body tensed in response, her pleasure immediate and audible as she cried out against him. He could feel every jolt of her pelvis meeting his, every breath taking him deeper. He let out a low groan of contentment, shuddering against her. His body convulsed, and he collapsed on top of her. Happily spent.

Hell
. She’d asked him to go slowly, and instead he’d taken her like an animal in heat. Rutting between her legs. Until he’d been completely and wholly immersed in her. Unable to tell where he stopped and she began.

“Glory,” he murmured quietly. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry?” Her voice cracked with unarticulated emotion. “Why?”

“You wanted me to go slow. I should have lasted longer.” He rolled off her, throwing the condom away in the trash can beside the bed before leaning back so they were lying side by side on the bed. He wrapped his arm around her shoulders. “I’m not usually so…excited.”

“No complaints here.” She bent her head slightly to kiss his shoulder. “Want to do it again?”

“Are you trying to kill me, Gloria?”

“The name’s Glory,” she corrected him quickly. “No one calls me Gloria.”

“All right then. You’re Glory.” Luke smiled as he turned to kiss her on the mouth. She was right. Gloria was a sensible name for a sensible woman, the preacher’s daughter who catered to an entire town’s wants and needs.

Glory was something else. Wild. Free.

Glory was
his
.

Chapter Nineteen

The early-morning light streaming through the borrowed bedroom’s small window made Glory glow, from her soft cheeks to her sinful lips to the long black eyelashes that fluttered open as she woke. Luke had been awake for a few minutes, spooning her from behind and marveling at what had passed between the two of them the night before.

“I can’t imagine what I did before I met you,” he said.

“You mean, before you got shot in the arm and your car died?” Glory’s face tilted toward him, a crazy grin plastered across her face.

“Clearly my imagination’s limited.” His hand splayed across her bare belly. When she tilted her face toward the sun, he said, “It’s going to be a beautiful day.”

“Maybe for you.”

“Looking forward to finally seeing your sister?” he asked.

Her body tensed. Her expression clouded. The woman he’d made love to the night before was gone, replaced by someone he couldn’t quite hold on to.

Damn. It was the wrong question to ask.

He started to speak—to apologize—but she held a hand up, silencing him.

“Not really.”

“I thought you were excited.”

“I was. Before I remembered that I’m the one who has to make Ashley understand that it’s over. We’ve lost Dandelion House—and Black Lake. I’m never going to come up with eight hundred thousand dollars. Which means we’ve lost Beaux. She’s not going to take it well.”

Eight hundred thousand dollars. A vast fortune to a small-town girl like Glory. Pocket change to Luke. But in all the time they’d spent together, she’d never once asked him for the money to buy Dandelion House. She’d never tried to con, cajole, or steal from him. Never tried to bargain with him or beg for a loan.

She’d turned down the two million to deliver him to Tiffanette without a second thought, and she’d never even asked him for the money.

Why hadn’t she asked? Pride? Or something else? It didn’t matter—not when it was within his power to wipe the frown from her face and brighten her day.

“You don’t need the money.” He curled his fingers slightly, traced a pattern across her silky skin. “I’ll buy Dandelion House.”

Glory’s eyes went wide. “Don’t joke about things you don’t understand.”

“I’m not joking.”

“You?” Her jaw dropped open in surprise. “Why would you want Dandelion House?”

The more he thought about it, the more it made sense. “It’ll make a good investment. If the town’s as perfect as you say, there’ll be people lining up around the block to rent the place.” Wheels began to spin in his head. “I could expand. Maybe get some property nearby, create a conference center or retreat—”

“Like hell!” Glory jolted to the side, her entire body retreating from his words. She scrambled from the bed, coming to standing in front of him, her face full of anger. “You don’t get it.”

“It solves all your problems.”

“It’s the same
freaking
problem!” she shouted. For one long moment her words hung in the air, making his ears ring.

“Glory—”

“No. We’ve already got an out-of-town businessman trying to take over our community. Thinking he can control everything just because he’s got money. Not everything is about money.”

“Money is essential—”

“Money can buy a lot of things, but it doesn’t change how you feel. It doesn’t change who you are. You can’t buy happiness, and you can’t buy Dandelion House. I won’t let you.” She stormed over to the bureau and slammed open one drawer after another until she found what she was looking for. Clean clothes tucked under her arm, she headed for the bathroom. “Whatever this thing was between us, it’s over.”

His chest squeezed tight. An unfamiliar pain gripping his insides. This was over? “Like hell. I don’t even know what ‘this’ is, but it can’t be over. Not yet.”

“Go back to Las Vegas. Stick to ruining your own damn town. Leave me and mine alone.”

No way. He wasn’t leaving her alone, no matter how “over” she thought things were between them. “Glory, it’s not safe. Tiffanette and her men could be in Beaux.”

“Doesn’t matter if she is. It’s a small town. We protect one another. Anybody steps out of line, they’ll get shot. I’ll be safe.” She stepped into the bathroom, pulling the door shut behind her. A moment later the room was flooded with the sound of pipes gurgling and the shower sputtering to life.

Safe in a town that didn’t even have its own police force? Luke swore. Who was she fooling? And more to the point, did she really think he’d leave no matter how broken things were between them? Maybe she didn’t know him as well as she thought.